2024 Copa America Prizm

[mossoholic]

Hobby already down to $250 a box. Too bad the price manipulators can't put new product for sale available to everyone at the actual market value on their website. Got to make sure they have the highest listed prices anywhere. Got to keep it artificially manipulated for as long as possible. On every product. For every sport.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Hobby already down to $250 a box. Too bad the price manipulators can't put new product for sale available to everyone at the actual market value on their website. Got to make sure they have the highest listed prices anywhere. Got to keep it artificially manipulated for as long as possible. On every product. For every sport.

I think that might be a contract thing with Panini/Topps more than anything (or even the distributors).

Regardless, this should be hitting 200 in the short term. It was insanely overpriced.

[gomiamigo]

I'm sure it's a contract thing for the distributors to prevent one from panicking and crushing the price for everyone else and making the product seem awful...when it's not. Prices always find the market equilibrium eventually.

[mossoholic]

Originally Posted by yiguiri2002

I think that might be a contract thing with Panini/Topps more than anything (or even the distributors).

Regardless, this should be hitting 200 in the short term. It was insanely overpriced.

Yeah probably the same "contract" that has required to Panini sell almost all hobby for a fraction of market value to the same small group for the last 4 1/2 years and counting when they could be selling it back to the exact same people in the exact same quantities at way higher prices.

If there is anything to do with not offering a lower price Im sure it would be based on MSRP. The MSRP was much lower than presale. MSRP is $250.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by gomiamigo

Prices always find the market equilibrium eventually.

In theory, yes.

But economic theory assumes rational behavior....and we all know that breakers and the gambling addicts who support them are NOT rational.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Yeah probably the same "contract" that has required to Panini sell almost all hobby for a fraction of market value to the same small group for the last 4 1/2 years and counting when they could be selling it back to the exact same people in the exact same quantities at way higher prices.

If there is anything to do with not offering a lower price Im sure it would be based on MSRP. The MSRP was much lower than presale. MSRP is $250.

Probably. I think that has been the standard for a long time, most of us remember when 90%+ of the releases would go down in price after a couple of weeks. We are going back to those days which is good.

I have no idea how MSRP impacts the agreed release price, hopefully someday someone will shine a light. The only thing I remember hearing is that release price can't be lower than MSRP.

Originally Posted by mfw13

In theory, yes.

But economic theory assumes rational behavior....and we all know that breakers and the gambling addicts who support them are NOT rational.

If there is a Copa America Prizm break in two months and boxes are $200, the break prices will reflect that.

On release it's different. Plenty of people join breaks to hit that big hit, sell it and cash out. The gap between box cost and the biggest hits are not as big when the release has been out for a while and the boxes go down in price.

[ThatGuyPal]

I'm sure people will still hate on them but megas for this don't seem that terrible compared to most soccer releases. Guaranteed numbered card /125 or less), pulsars look nicer than the usual mega parallels (subject to opinion), minimal chance at autos and while admittedly near impossible you at least have a CHANCE to hit the top guy unlike football/basketball, finally you have a chance at all the case hits.

[kyleuk21]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Hobby already down to $250 a box. Too bad the price manipulators can't put new product for sale available to everyone at the actual market value on their website. Got to make sure they have the highest listed prices anywhere. Got to keep it artificially manipulated for as long as possible. On every product. For every sport.

Not sure where you're seeing boxes at $250/per. Even ebay loose boxes are going for $300+.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by kyleuk21

Not sure where you're seeing boxes at $250/per. Even ebay loose boxes are going for $300+.

Crazy.....

This is a $80-100 a box product.

Even the Pulisic base auto is going for <$50.....and he's probably one of the top ten autos in the product.

[kyleuk21]

Originally Posted by mfw13

Crazy.....

This is a $80-100 a box product.

Even the Pulisic base auto is going for <$50.....and he's probably one of the top ten autos in the product.

Respectfully, you're way off. This is probably the best soccer product put out this year so far all things considered. Chrome is 10x worse than this and that's probably a conservative take.

[Gin&Juice]

Pretty low bar if a product without any European, African or Asian players is the product of the year, especially when it is just a sticker dump on Prizm cards.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by kyleuk21

Respectfully, you're way off. This is probably the best soccer product put out this year so far all things considered.

Respectfully, I'm not.

In my book, a top-quality product has to at a minimum be either a WC or Champions League product (so that the checklist includes stars from all confederations/top leagues), have a great design, include retired player content, and be affordable enough so that collectors can easily complete the base set.

This gets a "C" for the checklist by being solely a CONMEBOL/CONCACAF product, a "B" on base set affordability, and "C"'s on design & retired player content.

In my book, I'm not sure that there has been a "A"-quality soccer product in quite a long time....maybe since 2014 World Cup Prizm.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by mfw13

Respectfully, I'm not.

In my book, a top-quality product has to at a minimum be either a WC or Champions League product (so that the checklist includes stars from all confederations/top leagues), have a great design, include retired player content, and be affordable enough so that collectors can easily complete the base set.

This gets a "C" for the checklist by being solely a CONMEBOL/CONCACAF product, a "B" on base set affordability, and "C"'s on design & retired player content.

In my book, I'm not sure that there has been a "A"-quality soccer product in quite a long time....maybe since 2014 World Cup Prizm.

Higher quality doesn't mean higher value all the time.

I've been trying to get cards for my PC but they are going for more than I thought. Only one of the players I'm going after is in a Top 5 league and the average price exceeds most of the teams in big leagues. I wouldn't be shocked it that's the case with other teams.

[gomiamigo]

If you don't think Flawless was an A product you're simply not being serious.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by gomiamigo

If you don't think Flawless was an A product you're simply not being serious.

I don't think I'll even put 2014 WC Prizm as a Top 5 product, much less the best of the last decade.

[gomiamigo]

Originally Posted by yiguiri2002

I don't think I'll even put 2014 WC Prizm as a Top 5 product, much less the best of the last decade.

Cheap, easy to get, great checklist, good parallels, super-cheap, first WC Messi/Ronaldo autos, tons of supply, very cheap, golds black golds and black 1/1s, Ronaldo/Messi duals.

It was a pretty impressive release. But not the best!

[kyleuk21]

Originally Posted by mfw13

Respectfully, I'm not.

In my book, a top-quality product has to at a minimum be either a WC or Champions League product (so that the checklist includes stars from all confederations/top leagues), have a great design, include retired player content, and be affordable enough so that collectors can easily complete the base set.

This gets a "C" for the checklist by being solely a CONMEBOL/CONCACAF product, a "B" on base set affordability, and "C"'s on design & retired player content.

In my book, I'm not sure that there has been a "A"-quality soccer product in quite a long time....maybe since 2014 World Cup Prizm.

This is simply a bad take. If you don’t think a quality product has been made since 2014 Prizm (which was an ugly design with ugly inserts by the way) then I’m not sure why you’re spending any time in this forum and there's obviously no pleasing you. By your standards, this Copa product gets dumped on for simply not being Uefa or WC which is just weird.

The checklist - they did a solid job of giving the more popular teams more players which helps balance it out properly. They added inserts to include a large number of legends. Parallels are minimal with the highest number being /199.Messi autos are plentiful. They added the dual Messi/maradona for a big chase. Most of the big names are “hittable” in the sense of they have more than 5 auto copies in the product and you have a decent shot to hit one. In many cases, you hit two big names plus other mid-tier names and duals. It’s relatively short-printed as well giving a lot of low number color per case.

Retired player content - you have autos of pele, maradona, rivaldo, forlan, Ronaldo, ronaldinho, aguero, mascherano, and a number of other lesser names, some of which include dual autos. You also have scorers club and phenomenon inserts for all of those guys and others like kaka. Both of those insert sets look quite nice by the way. Idk what more you can ask for with retired players. A sp base card with all color parallels for 5-10 greats would’ve been cool maybe.

Affordability - I would agree on your B rating there. But relative to other products, I think this is no worse than any others.

I don’t even like Panini, but this product gets an A from me.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by gomiamigo

Cheap, easy to get, great checklist, good parallels, super-cheap, first WC Messi/Ronaldo autos, tons of supply, very cheap, golds black golds and black 1/1s, Ronaldo/Messi duals.

It was a pretty impressive release. But not the best!

Sure, but the design is awful. 2014 Prizm ranks as the worst for me and plenty of people has it as the bottom of his lists.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by kyleuk21

This is simply a bad take. If you don’t think a quality product has been made since 2014 Prizm (which was an ugly design with ugly inserts by the way) then I’m not sure why you’re spending any time in this forum and there's obviously no pleasing you. By your standards, this Copa product gets dumped on for simply not being Uefa or WC which is just weird.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

The main reasons that I downgrade most products is price....Topps basic UCL product is pretty much the only soccer product that released at <$100/box (maybe MLS is as well). Just about everything else is ridiculously overpriced.

Design is obviously a matter of personal opinion.

My point about checklists is valid....certainly single-federation and single-league products are going to have a constituency, but they're never going to have checklists as good as a World Cup or Champions League product.

Topps & Panini have been getting better about including more retired player content, but sticker autos (which is all Panini does) don't appeal to many collectors (like me).

What I would really like to see is for Topps to do a Archives/Heritage style product for the Champions League (and Panini for the World Cup), in which 30-40% of the checklist is retired players. Imagine a 500-card set in which the top 10-20 retired players from every major club have base cards, or a 300-card WC set in which the top ten retired players from every major country get base cards.

[kyleuk21]

Originally Posted by mfw13

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

The main reasons that I downgrade most products is price....Topps basic UCL product is pretty much the only soccer product that released at <$100/box (maybe MLS is as well). Just about everything else is ridiculously overpriced.

Design is obviously a matter of personal opinion.

My point about checklists is valid....certainly single-federation and single-league products are going to have a constituency, but they're never going to have checklists as good as a World Cup or Champions League product.

Topps & Panini have been getting better about including more retired player content, but sticker autos (which is all Panini does) don't appeal to many collectors (like me).

What I would really like to see is for Topps to do a Archives/Heritage style product for the Champions League (and Panini for the World Cup), in which 30-40% of the checklist is retired players. Imagine a 500-card set in which the top 10-20 retired players from every major club have base cards, or a 300-card WC set in which the top ten retired players from every major country get base cards.

Some fair points in there. Price of anything stinks these days. That's obviously an issue within the entirety of the market, though. I don't see it changing.

Sticker autos have been a standard with soccer products since forever (even 2014 world cup). Topps is doing a much better job with some on-card stuff since Fanatics took over, though, which is nice. I'm in the group of people that want on-card and match-worn.

I'm not sure a 500 card set would do it in the soccer market. Might be too much. I think baseball is the only sport that can get away with that. I do like the idea of legends getting some more base card spots, though.

[j0shuab]

To demonstrate the absurdity of the difference between box prices and singles prices, for less than the price of one box I've purchased:

4x Blue Shimmer Autos: Reyna, Richards, Adams, Weah
3x Autos /99: Scally, Mckennie, Friedel
2x Base Autos: Friedel, Pepi
Green Wave Auto: Adams
Orange /25: Pepi, Reyna, Weah
Purple /49: Mckennie, Weah
+ other assorted base, silver, ice, /199s from lots

And I'd give my bidding on this set a B-, I probably should have waited a bit longer for many of these. Will add a Pulisic auto and a couple of dual autos, and the total still will be about the cost of one box.

[Gin&Juice]

Originally Posted by j0shuab

To demonstrate the absurdity of the difference between box prices and singles prices, for less than the price of one box I've purchased:

4x Blue Shimmer Autos: Reyna, Richards, Adams, Weah
3x Autos /99: Scally, Mckennie, Friedel
2x Base Autos: Friedel, Pepi
Green Wave Auto: Adams
Orange /25: Pepi, Reyna, Weah
Purple /49: Mckennie, Weah
+ other assorted base, silver, ice, /199s from lots

And I'd give my bidding on this set a B-, I probably should have waited a bit longer for many of these. Will add a Pulisic auto and a couple of dual autos, and the total still will be about the cost of one box.

Love posts like this. My new form of collecting is allocating myself the price of a box/case of a set that I used to like opening and seeing what I can get for that price. Currently doing the same thing you did with Donruss and Chrome.

[LittleJimmies]

Originally Posted by j0shuab

To demonstrate the absurdity of the difference between box prices and singles prices, for less than the price of one box I've purchased:

4x Blue Shimmer Autos: Reyna, Richards, Adams, Weah
3x Autos /99: Scally, Mckennie, Friedel
2x Base Autos: Friedel, Pepi
Green Wave Auto: Adams
Orange /25: Pepi, Reyna, Weah
Purple /49: Mckennie, Weah
+ other assorted base, silver, ice, /199s from lots

And I'd give my bidding on this set a B-, I probably should have waited a bit longer for many of these. Will add a Pulisic auto and a couple of dual autos, and the total still will be about the cost of one box.

But you lowered your chances of hitting a gold Messi from 0.01% to 0.00%, where's the fun in that?!

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by j0shuab

To demonstrate the absurdity of the difference between box prices and singles prices, for less than the price of one box I've purchased:

4x Blue Shimmer Autos: Reyna, Richards, Adams, Weah
3x Autos /99: Scally, Mckennie, Friedel
2x Base Autos: Friedel, Pepi
Green Wave Auto: Adams
Orange /25: Pepi, Reyna, Weah
Purple /49: Mckennie, Weah
+ other assorted base, silver, ice, /199s from lots

And I'd give my bidding on this set a B-, I probably should have waited a bit longer for many of these. Will add a Pulisic auto and a couple of dual autos, and the total still will be about the cost of one box.

I agree with the main point (singles are the way to go versus box prices) but I don't think this comparison works. How much does the US cost per case on average? How many case breaks would you have to join to come out with this and be happy about it?

I think a lot of folks still don't know that some of the smaller teams are selling for way more than anyone would think. I've seen prices higher than WC Prizm for this is some cases, it's ridiculous.

[j0shuab]

Originally Posted by yiguiri2002

I agree with the main point (singles are the way to go versus box prices) but I don't think this comparison works. How much does the US cost per case on average? How many case breaks would you have to join to come out with this and be happy about it?

I think a lot of folks still don't know that some of the smaller teams are selling for way more than anyone would think. I've seen prices higher than WC Prizm for this is some cases, it's ridiculous.

For me, there's a few dynamics at play here in singles only strategy:

- I just don't want anything higher than /49, except for autos, even for the USMNT, for anything but World Cup sets, and even that might change - I've been working on the full set for 22 Prizm WC for the USA, and it's a slog, so much so that I probably won't do it for 2026.
- While smaller countries might be going for more than expected if you hit a gold, I really don't want to have to list a bunch of base, silvers, /199s and /115s for $2-5 each to make my money back on wax.
- I do very few breaks (my annual break budget is much less than $100), I was in just one for this set, and got the Reyna /25 and some base I'll throw in as freebies with other cards I sell. And most of the breaks I've seen listed for this set recently are partial case breaks, which is a no-go for me. Most USA player breaks, while obviously way cheaper than wax, are still negative average value, so I only do them very occasionally.
- Out of all the cards in my original post, 1 was from a break, 2 were from a fixed price lot, and the rest were auctions, mostly from Asia - as long as Asian resellers are willing to open a ton of wax and sell the singles, I think that's the play.